Welcome to The Norfolk Broads Forum
This is THE Worlds Largest Forum devoted to the Norfolk Broads, here you can discuss issues about the Norfolk Broads. Or just somewhere to chat with others interested in the Norfolk Broads area. In 2015 forum members spent 2,048 days afloat on the Broads

While I am sure most if not all of us have great respect for the hard work done by the foot soldiers how given the manipulation of committees and the total disregard for a large percentage of Private owners and the NSBA are we expected to have any trust or faith in the executive.

Sorry but that is not the feedback from those that attended the tolls meeting nor is it the experience of those of us who did or tried to communicate our views including the NSBA. as they say you can fool some of the people some of the time but not all of the people all the time

Representatives of the NSBA participated in a workshop in September 2015 which identified the key issues and established a degree of consensus about the direction of travel.

A further workshop for key stakeholders was held in 14 June 2016 which again included representatives of the NSBA and set out the initial views of the Tolls Working Group.

The NSBA and other external stakeholder organisations were invited to submit their comments on the draft proposals by the end of July 2016. The responses were received from the BHBF, NSBA and Broads Angling Strategy Group (BASG) were then included in the report to both the Navigation Committee meeting in October and the Broads Authority in November.

So Members of the Navigation Committee and the Broads Authority considered very carefully the views of the NSBA who supported the changes to the hire boat toll structure but not those for private boats.

The meeting of the Navigation Committee on 27th October was the formal consultation process. If you had attended the Navigation Committee you would have seen that the proposals were discussed at considerable length and all three main recommendations were supported by the Committee.

The views of the NSBA were not disregarded but at the end of the day the members of the Navigation Committee and the Broads Authority were of the view that the proposed change to a simpler relationship between the size of craft and tolls paid was fairer.

Although I couldn`t attend we had very good feedback from those that could and are fully aware of how the meeting was conducted and the conclusions reached, we also know the run up to those conclusions and in particular the people reaching those conclusions and those that were not allowed to question the decision, that doesn't answer why a large percentage of owners were not asked for an opinion and when expressed it was ignored along with the NSBA recommendations, given the unfair extremes of the final outcome I am sorry but there is no way you can say the decision taken was in the best interest of the majority of stakeholders.

To my mind one of the very major issues is that while everyone involved were totally up-front about their personal/special interests. They were still voting and/or making decisions that had a financial interest in their relationship with the BA.

There is a reason as to why insider trading is illegal.

Anyone having a financial interest in decisions made by the BA or Nav Com should not vote.

It's like caesar's wife.

When you guys appear to be not doing things right, and I'm not going to suggest anything corrupt, but the trust and respect from the Stakeholders will not happen when voting members can get a financial gain.

There are both winners and losers cost wise in the new system. Unfortunately for the BA the winners will sit quietly and the losers will create a fuss. No issues there as both stances are reasonable and normal. However, for balance, there are plenty who think that the new arrangements right a previous wrong and that their tolls were previously inflated. A difficult judgement call to make. It is impossible to please everyone. The correct process was followed so however this affected individuals we just have to accept it. Let us not forget this was not a cash grab (other than the reasonable 3% general increase). The BA end up with pretty much the same toll revenue.

Brian, The purpose of the Navigation Committee is to represent the different interests who use the waterways. Based on the Authority’s previous survey experience asking all 10,000 toll payers whether small boats should pay less and large boats more would have predictably given a polarised set of responses which would not have helped the Authority’s members in their decision making.

Richard The structure of the Navigation Committee is such that the different interested groups are present – both hire operators, private owners and other users of the waterways. They are given dispensation to participate in the debate on the setting of tolls. If this were not the case then almost all of the Committee would not be able to engage in the debate.

You still havn`t answered my question, given that a consensus of opinion across the forums and user groups shows a majority lack of confidence and trust in the executive how do you propose rectifying that.